Second Coming of Cyberangels

NEW YORK -- Lawyer Parry Aftab has transformed Cyberangels, the nonprofit Internet safety organization, from the whipping boy of cyberculture into a group lauded by both UNESCO and the FBI.

On Wednesday, Cyberangels and UNESCO-sponsored Wired Kids is hosting the Kids Internet Summit at the New York City Police Museum. The day-long event marks the launch of Wired Kids, and brings together authorities on child Internet safety, representatives of children's content providers, Cyberangel's own volunteers, and, of course, kids themselves.

It is also the latest indication of the Cyberangels' metamorphosis. Before Aftab assumed leadership of Cyberangels in late 1998, a critical Wired magazine castigated the group's gung-ho moralism and illegal search-and-seizure methods, including downloading and trading kiddie porn to entrap criminals.

But under Aftab things have changed.

"Even their logo was dark and undercover. These eyes staring out at you and funny-looking wings," said Aftab. "Now we're all angels and hugs. Of course, meanwhile, we're doing undercover work with Customs [the U.S. Customs Department] to catch child pornographers."

Jorge Martinez, the supervisory agent in charge of the FBI's Innocent Images anti-child pornography and exploitation task force, said "Pre-Parry Aftab, the FBI didn't have a working relationship with Cyberangels. Now Parry Aftab is an invaluable resource to law enforcement. Her group's helped us to convict at least three child predators that I know of. I can't say enough good things about her."

The gregarious, wisecracking Persian lawyer has established herself as one of the Internet safety's most influential players and has emerged as a nonprofit leader. Last year, Aftab was appointed the founding American director of UNESCO's global Child Safeline project.

Aftab and Cyberangels has thrived by forging coalitions between some of the most intractable, contentious groups on the Net. She won over parents by simplifying Internet safety on her website and in her books The Parents Guide to Protecting Your Children In Cyberspace and A Parent's Guide to the Internet.

As a free-speech advocate, Aftab stood against the Child Online Protection Act and impressed privacy and free-speech advocates like the ACLU.

And her Web cheerleading has convinced scores of tech companies to work with her Wired Kids project. As an experienced international lawyer, she has been able to work closely with the FBI, U.S. Customs, and the New York attorney general's office. And she does all of this without pay, often working double the hours of a normal work week.

Like Aftab, Debbie Mahoney, Cyberangels Internet patrol director and the director of the advocacy group Soc-Um, also works without pay.

Mahoney, whose own son was molested by a neighbor, said, "Working this issue every day, it either has to be your passion, you have to understand the issue, or you know the horror. Parry gets it."

But child advocacy was not Aftab's first calling. A practicing lawyer at Aftab & Savitt in Paramus, New Jersey, Aftab opened her own law practice in Paramus in 1989. Desperate for legal assistance, she began searching the Internet for advice, and accidentally became a pioneer of cyberspace law. She moderated AOL's original Legal Board for four years before forming and hosting the Court TV Law Center Legal Helpline in 1996.

But Aftab's first encounter with child porn changed her career forever.

In 1996, Curtis Sliwa, founder of the Guardian Angels, and Aftab's legal client, asked her to direct his Cyberangels site temporarily. Aftab, who, it seems, cannot turn any work down, said she'd try it out.

The first time she followed a tip, she said, she found 50 images of children having sex with adults, including a little girl about 4 years old.

"Full intercourse. She was sitting astride a man, but facing away and into the camera," Aftab said "You could see the full penetration, but she had her eyes closed with this If-I-close-my-eyes-then-I'm-not-here expression, like kids do when they want to pretend that something isn't really happening. I got sick to my stomach. Then I called Curtis, and I said I'd run the place."

Aftab has since helped hundreds of parents. One of them received a call from the FBI in November of 1998, telling her that naked pictures of her 12-year-old daughter and 12 other girls had been found in the daily planner of 38-year-old Charles Hatch.

The mother, who asked to remain anonymous, said she was frantic.

"I didn't have any idea of what to do or what would happen. I didn't know who or what to trust," she said.

But she logged onto the Cyberangels site, and found Aftab. The mother recorded an impact statement in court and became the first-ever parent of an Internet luring victim to testify publicly. Hatch was sentenced to six-and-a-half years.

"I wouldn't have made it there if it wasn't for Parry Aftab," the mother said.

In the wake of a recent Reader's Digest feature, Aftab gets more than a thousand emails a day for parents looking for help. Aftab said she planned the Kids Internet Conference to showcase the work of the Cyberangels and to honor kid-friendly sites and services.